Julie Dermansky – Olduvai.ca

Resident returns home amid floodwaters on Isle de Jean Charles in Louisiana

While most of Louisiana was spared Barry’s wrath last week, Isle de Jean Charles, a quickly eroding strip of land among coastal wetlands in the Gulf of Mexico, was not. A storm surge swept over the island, about 80 miles southwest of New Orleans, early in the morning on July 13 before Barry was upgraded from a tropical storm to a category 1 hurricane.

On July 15, I met with Albert Naquin, Chief of the Isle de Jean Charles Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Tribe (IDJC) and Wenceslaus Billiot Jr., the Tribe’s deputy chief, to travel to the island and assess the damages. That afternoon, we made our way through the receding waters that still covered Island Road, the only route connecting the island to the mainland. Days after the storm, some parts of the road on the island were still submerged in three feet of water.

Chief Albert Naquin near dead fish in floodwaters and a truck on the Isle de Jean Charles

Albert Naquin, Chief of the Isle de Jean Charles Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Tribe (IDJC), on the island standing near dead fish in the floodwaters.

Fishing camps and homes damaged amid floodwaters on the Isle de Jean Charles after Tropical Storm Barry

Fishing camps and permanent residences on the island were difficult to access on July 15, due to remaining floodwater following Barry’s storm surge.

The Isle de Jean Charles received worldwide attention in 2016, when the IDJC Tribe helped the State of Louisiana secure a $48 million federal grant to resettle the disappearing island’s residents.

The resettlement project drew considerable notice from both the media and those looking for models to relocate other coastal communities due to sea level rise quickened by climate change. Years later, however, the Tribe can point toward little progress in permanently relocating the less than 20 families remaining on the island — most of which belong to the IDJC Tribe.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Fossil Fuels and Climate Denial Still Reign in Louisiana Despite Scientists’ Dire Warnings for the State

December 22, 2018

Fossil Fuels and Climate Denial Still Reign in Louisiana Despite Scientists’ Dire Warnings for the State

Christmas lights on homes across from the Meraux Refinery in Meraux, New Orleans.

The impacts to the region, such as worsening floods, heat waves, and sea level rise, will only be intensified as the globe continues warming, warn federal scientists in the latest National Climate Assessment report.

But instead of heeding scientists’ warnings, Louisiana’s government continues to welcome the prospects of new billion-dollar petrochemical plants, liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities, and an oil export hub, all without a mention of their climate change impacts.

Leading the pack, Gov. John Bel Edwards continues to gush over turning Louisiana into a world leader in natural gas and oilexports.

Louisiana politicians continue to claim natural gas is a “clean” source of energy, and usher in not only LNG facilities, but also petrochemical plants fueled by natural gas production.

In Plaquemines Parish, a peninsula south of New Orleans that, like all of southern Louisiana, is plagued by coastal erosion, the governor has hailed a new crude oil export terminal and a massive LNG facility that don’t yet have permits.

Embracing Fossil Fuels But Ignoring Climate Warnings

Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards
Gov. John Bel Edwards, when he was still a candidate for Louisiana Governor at a Democratic Party fundraiser in New Orleans in 2015.

I asked the governor’s press secretary what he thought about the Fourth National Climate Assessment, an exhaustive review of environmental data by a team of hundreds of scientists that puts Louisiana square in the eye of physical and financial hardship due to climate change — and got no reply.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

South Carolina Still Grappling with Historic Flooding from Florence, a Storm Worsened by Climate Change

October 2, 2018

South Carolina Still Grappling with Historic Flooding from Florence, a Storm Worsened by Climate Change

April O'Leary kayaks to her flooded home in Conway, South Carolina

South Carolina was spared the worst of Hurricane Florence’s fury when the storm made landfall in North Carolina on September 14, but did not escape its catastrophic impacts. Nearly two weeks later, the state was still contending with historic flooding.

Flooded house on South Carolina coast
Flooded house in Socastee, South Carolina.

Florence lingered over the Carolinas, dumping more than 30 inches of rain in some areas. Five rivers and the IntraCoastal Waterway crested several feet above major flood stage, resulting in flooding that will last for weeks to come in parts of South Carolina. Cities and towns on its northern coast are experiencing the worst of it, where standing water remains in buildings along the Intracoastal Waterway and near riverbanks deep into the Carolinas.

Flooded mobile home in Bucksport, South Carolina.

Pine Grove Baptist Church in Brittons Neck, South Carolina.

Jane and Chris Ochsenbein, owners of Gator Bait Adventure Tours in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, took me on a kayak tour of flooded areas 10 days after the storm hit the coast.

On September 26, we met up with April O’Leary, a program officer for Winyah Rivers Foundation and the Waccamaw Riverkeeper program, in Conway, a city about 15 miles from South Carolina’s coast.

Chris Ochsenbein pulls a kayak into floodwaters in Conway, South Carolina
Chris Ochsenbein pulling a kayak into floodwater in Conway, South Carolina’s Sherwood neighborhood.

April O’Leary, in front of her flooded home in Conway, South Carolina, on September 26.

We paddled our way to her home in Conway’s Sherwood neighborhood the day that the Waccamaw River crested, reaching 21.16 feet, 7 feet over major flood stage. O’Leary later told me that level set a new record by more than three feet. The previous record, 17.89 feet, was set following Hurricane Matthew just two years earlier.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Supercharged by Pollution, Florida’s Toxic Algae Crisis Continues Unabated

August 19, 2018

Supercharged by Pollution, Florida’s Toxic Algae Crisis Continues Unabated

“I think it is better if kids see what we are doing to the planet,” Womble told me. “Maybe seeing the dead turtle will make them pay attention to the environment.” Her 9-year-old sister Ellie agreed, adding that “covering the turtle won’t stop other turtles from dying.”

Earlier that day the sisters had been on a charter fishing boat 10 miles off Sanibel Island’s coast, where they saw lots of dead fish, large and small, and another dead sea turtle floating on the Gulf of Mexico’s surface. Though they caught some fish, their father, an avid fisherman, had his daughters throw them back. He explained to them that it may be years before marine life can recover from the impacts of the ongoing explosion of toxic algae that already has killed hundreds of tons of fish and other sea life washing up on Florida’s southwest coast.

Dead tarpon fish on Sanibel Island's beach in Florida
Dead tarpon on Sanibel Island’s beach.

Womble sisters and a dead loggerhead sea turtle on Sanibel Island.

The mass mortality of aquatic life — which some have called “unprecedented” — along 150 miles of Florida’s Gulf Coast, stretching from Naples in the south to Sarasota in the north, is the result of harmful algal blooms, which have been supercharged by pollution.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Fueled by Pollution and Unsound Policies, Toxic Algae Overtakes Florida Beaches and Waterways

August 4, 2018

Fueled by Pollution and Unsound Policies, Toxic Algae Overtakes Florida Beaches and Waterways

Sunset over a canal in Cape Coral, Florida, filled with blue green algae.

Parts of South Florida are being inundated by harmful algal blooms, which affect both public health and marine life, including red tide (caused by the alga Karenia brevis) and blue-green algae (more precisely known as cyanobacteria, or Microcystis, which are technically bacteria but commonly referred to as algae).

While both types of toxin-producing algae are normal parts of their environments, the crisis is not. Water pollution and climate change are fueling this supersized toxic algae mess.

Cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, in a canal near the Cape Coral Yacht Club in Florida.

Fish kill on a beach in Boca Grande, Florida.

The state’s water quality standards, friendly toward agriculture and real estate development, result in the release of an abundance of nutrients including phosphorus and nitrogen into the water. This influx of growth-inducing nutrients causes marine and freshwater algae populations to explode in what’s called a “bloom.” These blooms can use up much of the oxygen in the water, causing aquatic life to die, in addition to the potentially fatal toxins these algae release.

Storm run-off from agricultural and urban landscapes, laden with fertilizers and animal manure, and badly maintained septic systems contribute to the current crisis. On top of this, massive releases of polluted freshwater, laden with cyanobacteria, from Lake Okeechobee are ending up on both of the state’s coasts. And when the freshwater cyanobacteria hit the saltwater, they die, creating even more nutrients that feed the red tide.

Photographer’s sneakers on a concrete seawall on the side of a toxic algae-filled canal in Cape Coral, Florida.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Bayou Bridge Pipeline Opponents Say Louisiana Governor’s Office Is Surveilling Them

March 8, 2018

Bayou Bridge Pipeline Opponents Say Louisiana Governor’s Office Is Surveilling Them

Louisiana Bucket Brigade founder Anne Rolfes at a press conference protesting Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards' treatment of anti-pipeline activists.

Opponents of the Bayou Bridge pipeline accused Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards of meeting with representative of the oil and gas industry while refusing to meet with activists and communities affected by the pipeline’s construction. They further allege that the administration has instead placed them under surveillance, pointing to similar treatment of Dakota Access pipeline opponents in North Dakota in 2016. Their claims are based in part on emails and other public records released by the state.

The activists brought their grievances to the Democratic governor’s home and office on March 1, holding a press conference in front of the Governor’s Mansion in Baton Rouge and then occupying the foyer to his office in the State Capitol for over an hour.

“The Bayou Bridge pipeline should be called the John Bel pipeline,” Louisiana Bucket Brigade founder and director Anne Rolfes declared at the press conference. In her view, “any accidents that will happen” related to the pipeline lead back to the Governor. He had the power to stop it, she said, but chose not to.

At the press conference, representatives from the HELP Association, 350 New Orleans, L’eau est La Vie (Water Is Life) camp, and the Center for Constitutional Rights also expressed disappointment in what they described as the state government’s cozy relationship with industry.

Louisiana Bucket Brigade read aloud emails about the Bayou Bridge pipeline from the Edwards administration and industry that were obtained by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), a New York-based legal and educational nonprofit.

Pastor Harry Joseph of Mt. Triumph Baptist Church in St. James, Louisiana
Pastor Harry Joseph of the Mount Triumph Baptist Church in St. James, where the pipeline will terminate, speaking at the press conference in Baton Rouge.

Security staff at the Louisiana Bucket Brigade press conference March 1
Security next to the press conference in Baton Rouge.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Federal Judge Halts Bayou Bridge Pipeline Installation, But Photos Show Damage Already Inflicted

February 26, 2018

Federal Judge Halts Bayou Bridge Pipeline Installation, But Photos Show Damage Already Inflicted

Jody Meche, crawfisher, viewing the Bayou Bridge pipeline construction damage to the Atchafalaya Basin

U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick wrote that she was enjoining further work on the pipeline in the basin “in order to prevent further irreparable harm until this matter can be tried on the merits.” She will release her reasoning for ordering ETP to stop construction in the coming days.

The Bayou Bridge pipeline will be the last leg of the Dakota Access, carrying oil fracked in North Dakota to Louisiana. The final stretch of the project, if built as proposed, will span 162.5 miles from Lake Charles to St. James, cutting through the Atchafalaya Basin, a national heritage area and the country’s largest swamp.

Route of the Bayou Bridge pipeline in the Atchafalaya Basin filled with debris.

The lawsuit Earthjustice filed in federal court on January 11 against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on behalf of the Atchafalaya Basinkeeper, the Louisiana Crawfish Producers Association-West, Gulf Restoration Network, the Waterkeeper Alliance, and the Sierra Club, alleges that the Corps acted “arbitrarily and capriciously” when it issued a permit for the pipeline.

The plaintiffs were relieved by the judge’s ruling, and look forward to presenting their case in court, which they are confident will show cause to stop any new pipeline from being built until non-complaint companies fix existing problems.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Minority Communities Suffer from Storms as GOP and Trump Admin Promote Oil and Gas

October 27, 2017

Minority Communities Suffer from Storms as GOP and Trump Admin Promote Oil and Gas

Pat Harris in her storm-damaged housing complex in Port Arthur, Texas

On October 18, two senators who reject the science of climate change, Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA), teamed up to introduce a bill to fast-track the regulatory process for exporting small-scale liquefied natural gas (LNG). And on October 24, Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke proposed the largest ever sale of oil and gas leases in the United States. The plan would offer nearly 77 million acres of federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico for auction to the fossil fuel industry.

Port Arthur's Prince Hall Village Apartments across from a Valero refinery
Prince Hall Village Apartments across from Valero’s Port Arthur refinery on October 13, 2017.

FEMA interviewing residents of a housing complex in Port Arthur, Texas
FEMA interviewing residents at Prince Hall Village Apartments on September 20, 2017.

Rubio and Cassidy now both acknowledge that the climate has changed, but don’t think mankind plays a major role in the stronger and more frequent storms, droughts, heat waves, and floods documented by researchers. Both have touted the expansion of the natural gas industry as good for the climate, citing the fact that gas burns cleaner than coal. But they ignore scientific evidence showing that when accounting for the production of natural gas, from extraction to delivery, the fuel could be worse for the climate than burning coal.

Their proposed legislation, if passed, would likely lead to an expansion of the fracking industry to meet the needs of the global market, as DeSmog’s Steve Horn has reported recently. In his article, Horn explained the misnomer of “small-scale LNG,” writing that “small-scale LNG does not refer necessarily to the actual amount of LNG which will be exported from the site, but rather the size of the tankers carrying the natural gas.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

From Homes to Refineries, Finding Pollution and Loss in Harvey’s Path

September 8, 2017

From Homes to Refineries, Finding Pollution and Loss in Harvey’s Path

Mobil station with floodwaters from Hurricane Harvey

Getting there was no easy matter. I was forced to drive west in the eastbound lane of the interstate because the lanes I should have been driving in were flooded up to the top of the highway divider. All the while, I tried not to worry about the water rushing through cracks in the cement divider, which had the potential to give way.

Parts of Vidor were only accessible by boat or in a high-clearance vehicle. I hitched a ride in a monster truck, which pushed water over cars stuck in the floodwaters as we passed by a Mobil gas station, also submerged. I noted the irony considering ExxonMobil’s history of funding climate science denial and Harvey’s intensity tied to climate change.

Mobil gas station underwater in Vidor, Texas
Mobil gas station in Vidor, Texas, on August 31.

A Texas house flooded up to the roof
Home in Vidor, Texas, flooded up to its roof.

People and a dog in a motor boat navigate the flooded streets of Vidor, Texas

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Environmental Concerns — and Anger — Grow in Month After Thousand-Year Flood Strikes Louisiana

September 17, 2016

Environmental Concerns — and Anger — Grow in Month After Thousand-Year Flood Strikes Louisiana

Contents from a flooded home in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, awaiting removal on Sept 9.

In the aftermath of the 1000-year flood that hit southern Louisiana in August, environmental and public health concerns are mounting as the waters recede.

Residents want to know why many areas that never flooded before were left in ruin this time, raising questions about the role water management played in potentially exacerbating the flood. The smell of mold lingers on streets where the contents from flooded homes and businesses are stacked in piles along the curbside, as well as in neighborhoods next to landfills where storm debris is taken.

Polluted Floodwaters

I met up with Frank Bonifay whose home and business are in the Spanish Lake Basin region, about 20 miles south of Baton Rouge. We went to his home on Alligator Bayou Road, which for weeks after the flood was only accessible by boat.

Car in flooded Louisiana neighborhood.

On our way we drove past the Honeywell Geismar chemical plant near Saint Gabriel, where workers were dumping soda ash into standing floodwater next to the plant. The Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality (LDEQ) explained via email that the workers were adding soda ash to the water and circulating it with pumps to raise the pH following a release of sulfuric acid and oleum that occurred during an August 13 rainstorm.

“Anything stirred up by the flood in the industrial corridor is ultimately going to end up at my land,“ Bonifay told me. It angered him that the LDEQ didn’t inform residents with property nearby like himself.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Fate of Keystone XL Pipeline Could Be Decided in a Texas Courtroom Before NAFTA Tribunal Considers TransCanada’s Suit

July 5, 2016

Fate of Keystone XL Pipeline Could Be Decided in a Texas Courtroom Before NAFTA Tribunal Considers TransCanada’s Suit

Texas landowner Michael Bishop continues to challenge TransCanada’s right to build the southern route of the Keystone XL pipeline, renamed the Gulf Coast pipeline when the project was divided into segments. Meanwhile, TransCanada is suing the United States for not being granted the presidential permit needed in order to build the Keystone XL‘s northern route. A win for Bishop in his suit against TransCanada Keystone Pipeline L.P. in Nacogdoches County District Court could complicate TransCanada’s North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) challenge.

Bishop is suing TransCanada for “fraud, conspiracy to commit fraud, misrepresentation, perjury, theft, bribery, and violating plaintiff’s rights as delineated under the Constitution of the State of Texas.” His case alleges TransCanada doesn’t rightfully possess common carrier status, which enabled the company to use eminent domain.

On June 4, a judge in Nacogdoches County District Court heard motions by Bishop and TransCanada and made rulings that left Bishop’s case in play. The judge granted Bishop a continuance, giving him more time for discovery, and refused to hear TransCanada’s lawyers’ motion for a ”no-evidence summary judgment” against Bishop that would have stopped his case.

TransCanada’s lawyers argued Bishop’s claims against the company have been asked and answered in other legal challenges by Bishop and other landowners, including Texas rancher Julia Trigg Crawford. Crawford, who challenged TransCanada’s status as a common carrier, lost her case in an appellate court, and then was denied a chance to have her case heard by the Texas Supreme Court.

But Bishop successfully argued that he never was given a chance to fully make his case against TransCanada’s standing as a common carrier, and that the matter is still unsettled.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Shell Oil Spill Cleanup Operation Ends As Voices Against New Gulf Drilling Grow Louder

May 19, 2016

Shell Oil Spill Cleanup Operation Ends As Voices Against New Gulf Drilling Grow Louder

Both entities stated that no environmental damage has been reported, but independent monitors from Greenpeace, Vanishing Earth and Wings Of Care question whether the size and potential impact of the spill are being downplayed.

News of Shell’s oil spill 90 miles south of Louisiana’s Timbalier Island came the day before the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) hosted a final week of public meetings on the Gulf Coast to give the public a chance to comment on its Five Year Plan 2017-2022 oil leasing program. Its plan calls for lease sales of 47 million acres of the Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas companies for offshore drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf.

Shell contracted Clean Gulf Associates and Marine Spill Response Corporation (MSRC) for the cleanup operation. MSRC, one of the companies BP used to clean up its 2010 spill, dumped the dispersant Corexit in the Gulf.

This time, “dispersant wasn’t used,” the Coast Guard told DeSmog. The Coast Guard and Shell agreed that using on-water recovery vessels and skimming would be the best oil recovery option.

Environmental scientist Wilma Subra, though pleased dispersant wasn’t used, told DeSmog, “Skimming is not a very good oil recovery option.”

Subra believes that if skimming is the best cleanup method the Coast Guard and oil companies can come up with, it shows they are no better prepared for an oil spill than they were when the BP oil disaster occurred.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Exclusive: Release of Inspection Reports From TransCanada’s Keystone Pipeline Expose Risk of Future Spills

May 5, 2016

Exclusive: Release of Inspection Reports From TransCanada’s Keystone Pipeline Expose Risk of Future Spills

Inspectors at the US Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) observed TransCanada’s contractors violating construction design codes established to ensure a pipeline’s safety, according to inspection reports released to DeSmog under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

Evan Vokes, former TransCanada materials engineer-turned-whistleblower, told DeSmog the problems uncovered in the reports show issues that could lead to future pipeline failures and might also explain some of the failures the pipeline had already suffered.

Vokes claimed PHMSA was negligent in failing to use its powers to shut down construction of the pipeline when inspectors found contractors doing work incorrectly. “You cannot have a safe pipeline without code compliance,” Vokes said.

The Keystone and the Cushing Extension are part of TransCanada’s Keystone Pipeline network, giving the company a path to move diluted Canadian tar sands, also known as dilbit, to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

The Keystone pipeline network is made up of the Keystone Pipeline (Phase I), that runs from Hardistry, Alberta, to Steele City, Nebraska, and the Keystone-Cushing extension (Phase ll), from Steele City to Cushing, Oklahoma. There, it connects to the southern route of the Keystone XL, renamed the Gulf Coast Extension (Phase III), that runs from Cushing, Oklahoma to the Gulf Coast in Texas.

The final phase of TransCanada’s network, the Keystone XL, (Phase lV), originating in Alberta, is meant to connect to the Gulf Coast pipeline. But KXL is blocked for now since President Obama rejected a permit TransCanada needs to finish its network.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Environmentalists Join Forces in New Orleans To Foster A Growing Alliance to Combat Climate Change and Fossil Fuels

March 28, 2016

Environmentalists Join Forces in New Orleans To Foster A Growing Alliance to Combat Climate Change and Fossil Fuels

The ceremony took place on the fourth day of programming hosted by the environmental advocacy group Indigena, on climate change and communities fighting against it.

“Creative alliances are formed when you are invited to come together,” Janet MacGillivray, Esq., with Indigena, told DeSmog. “That’s what we did with the four days of gatherings at the New Orleans Healing Center.”

Keeper of the Mountains Foundation president Paul Corbit Brown, and Jane Kleeb, founder of Bold Nebraska, were among the invited speakers who stressed the need for groups to come together.

They joined Louisiana environmental groups and activists who participated in panel discussions in the days before a protest by hundreds of Gulf Coast residents and environmentalists from across the country against the federal lease sale of 44.3 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico to the oil and gas industry.

Video: Paul Corbit Brown speaks in New Orleans

Holding up a bottle of polluted water from Fayetteville, West Virginia, at a panel discussion on climate change injustice, Brown told the audience that water from the river where he took the sample made it to New Orleans before he did.

“Polluted water in West Virginia doesn’t stay in West Virginia,” he said. ”It makes it way to other places, including here.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Extreme Weather, Widespread Flooding Hammer Louisiana as Federal Government Prepares to Lease Gulf of Mexico for Drilling

March 15, 2016

Extreme Weather, Widespread Flooding Hammer Louisiana as Federal Government Prepares to Lease Gulf of Mexico for Drilling

Walter Unglaub never thought flooding would threaten the carriage house he rents in St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana. It is on a bluff 30 feet above the Bogue Falaya River, in an area that is not considered a flood zone.

But that didn’t stop a flash flood from forcing Unglaub to swim for his life to get to higher ground awaiting rescue last Friday.

“No one is safe from extreme weather,” Unglaub told DeSmog on Sunday when he returned to sort through his belongings to see what, if anything, was salvageable.

After two days of intermittent rain, 14 inches of rain fell Friday night. This extreme weather event took place 12 days before the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) will auction drilling leases to 43 million acres of federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico.

VIDEO: Walter Unglaub returns home for the first time after the floodwaters drop

Initial records released by the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness say about 5,000 homes in Louisiana sustained flood damage following a deluge. The count is likely to grow as the damage assessment in Southeast Louisiana is not complete.

Rescue crews evacuate residents in the Tallow Creek subdivision to safety. © 2016 Julie Dermansky

From Tangipahoa, St Tammany and Washington Parishes, 1,500 residents were rescued by the time the Tchefuncte River and Bogue Falaya River peaked on Saturday morning. And more damage is likely Monday evening when the West Pearl River, further south, crests well above flood stage in the town of Pearl River.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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